


Fear of the Dark

by rosiedoesfic



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy
Genre: M/M, Magic, Magical Realism, Non-Denominational Paganism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-25
Updated: 2017-10-01
Packaged: 2018-08-27 00:37:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8380945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosiedoesfic/pseuds/rosiedoesfic
Summary: It's almost the Hallowe'en after Take This To Your Grave is released. Disappointed with the reception it has received, Pete decides they need to turn to unorthodox sources for support.





	1. Pioneer to the Falls

**Author's Note:**

> This story is broken down into four parts: Earth, Air, Water & Fire.
> 
> Although I am a practicing pagan, and many of the references are based on widely accepted concepts within the pagan community, this fic should not be taken as literal, nor is it a how-to manual or intended to represent any particular path or culture. Many elements are deliberately omitted or fictionalised for the sake of brevity and narrative. 
> 
> If you are interested in learning about paganism, you could do far worse than visiting the website of the [Order of Bards, Ovates & Druids](http://www.druidry.org).
> 
> * * *
> 
> Huge thanks to my friend and beta, [distortedmya](http://archiveofourown.org/users/distortedmya/pseuds/distortedmya), for sharing my madness in relation to this fic.

**Pioneer to the Falls**  
_We are the same blood_  
  
  
The wind whipped dry leaves around Patrick's ankles as he stood on the sidewalk, waiting for Pete to return with his third pumpkin spice latte of the day. Across the street a plastic sheet with painted on eyes and wibbly, screaming mouth flapped in the breeze. He was studying his copy of Billboard magazine, flipping page after page, trying to find a review of the album, or a live show, or _anything_ to say that their hard work and living on PB &J sandwiches had meant something to _someone_. He was starting to realise that maybe there wasn't anything in there this week, either.  
  
"Dude, maybe it'll be in next week's?" Joe offered, sipping the pop from the rim of his can and prodding him in the calf with his battered blue Puma. He held his bag of Peeps tombstones out for him to take.  
  
Patrick shook his head.  
  
"Don't be bummed out, little dude, we'll make it. It's just that, like, nobody's ready for this level of awesome."  
  
Joe's endless optimism about the band - or, as seemed increasingly likely, delusion - was one of the things that made Patrick fond of him. But it was also often the reason he wanted to smack him in the teeth, and today he wasn't sure which way he was leaning.  
  
"We need a stunt," Pete announced, stepping out of the coffee shop behind them.  
  
Patrick muttered, "But we already have _you_ ," slapping his magazine shut and rolling it up to stick it in his back pocket.  
  
" _Stunt_ ," Joe clarified, grinning and catching his eye.  
  
He couldn't help smiling back, in spite of his sour mood. That was another thing that made him fond of Joe: his big, stupid grin. And his wit. And his apparent lack of dignity or any desire to display any. Also, despite the madlibs trains of thought that came out of his mouth, sometimes, he was kind of smart. And he had the loveliest, saddest eyes of pretty much anyone he'd ever met. Fundamentally, Patrick really liked Joe, and it was starting to become a Thing.  
  
"Look. We need attention, am I right? So, maybe we need to do something to get that, kind of."  
  
"Isn't that why we're touring?"  
  
"I'm pretty sure that I've like, spent two thirds of my life since we formed this band trying to annoy people into buying our stuff," Joe noted, with a marshmallow tucked into each cheek. "It hasn't worked, so far."  
  
Ahead of them, Andy appeared out of an alleyway, brandishing a Blockbusters bag and looking both ways down the street. He beckoned them over. "Check this out!"  
  
The shop was small and dark, lit by lamps and candles in large glass vessels. It smelled faintly of smoke and strongly of something Patrick recognised but couldn't place. At once citrusy and floral and musky. It was how he imagined the casbah in Raiders of the Lost Ark would have smelled. Old and mysterious. It made him feel pleasantly light headed as he wandered around the store, reading the names of the books on the shelves - some paperback with tatty spines, others leatherbound and thick.  
  
"Check out that dummy," Joe hissed in his ear, nodding over to the counter at a figure in a dark paisley blouse, with a long, thick grey beard that blended into his hair below the shoulder. The dummy responded by turning to look at him and Joe grasped a fistful of Patrick's bodywarmer and gave a small yelp of fright, ducking behind him as he muttered, "Holy fucking _shit_ , dude."  
  
Patrick tried not to laugh. He didn't want to come into the guy's store and seem rude. He shrugged Joe off and smiled at the man, moving along to the next cabinet. It was glass fronted and filled with an assortment of curious objects. Some metal and shaped into stars or crescent moons, carved bells and chalices, a knife curved almost into a circle. Pendants and rings were displayed in dark velvet boxes, none of them with any prices on them, on shelves dotted with what looked like crystals and geodes.  
  
"What is this place, man?" Joe asked, back at his ear again, sounding bewildered.  
  
"I think it's what we call, ' _a bookstore_ '," Patrick whispered.  
  
He was pleased when Joe laughed and gave him a light shove in the back of the shoulder before wandering over to talk to Andy.  
  
On the other side of the store, Pete was looking at a book. The cover was pinkish brown hide of some kind and its pages were yellow and dusty at the edges. He looked deep in thought, his eyebrows furrowed as he scanned the pages.  
  
"What's that?"  
  
The book was slammed shut and stuffed back on a shelf. "Nothing."  
  
Patrick knew better than that. "Uh _huh_ ," he nodded slowly, wondering what the hell Pete was up to. "So, can we go home, now? It's Scary Movie Saturday, man, you promised me popcorn and scary monsters."  
  
"Sure," Pete said, turning him by the shoulders and pushing him towards the door. "Let's go."  
  
They'd reached the corner of the street when Pete cursed and said he'd forgotten his coffee. He turned and walked back towards the alley. "I'll catch you up."  
  
\---  
  
The futon in the apartment was small, and fucked beyond repair, but they all fitted on it, just. Patrick complained about it constantly until he realised he could use the dip in the base as an excuse to rest his weight on Joe. Joe never complained. In fact, sometimes he'd insist that Pete move over so he could sit in the middle, if Patrick was already sitting on the end. He didn't want to read too much into it, but at least it seemed that Joe didn't mind.  
  
Tonight, he climbed over three pairs of outstretched legs, carrying the bowl of microwave popcorn, to sit on the far end of the couch and squash himself down next to Patrick. He took a handful of kernels and shovelled half of them into his mouth before pushing the bowl on to Patrick's lap.  
  
"Tho waf are we waffing firff?"  
  
Andy grinned and presented a box with four girls in short skirts and what looked like school uniforms on the front.  
  
"Dude, we told you: no dirty films," Patrick sighed, tossing a piece of popcorn at his face.  
  
"It's not a dirty film!" Andy retorted, picking it out of his lap and eating it. "It does have a bunch of pretty girls in it, though…"  
  
"It's also as cool as fuck!" Pete added, pressing the play button on the remote. "It's about a girl that starts a new school and starts hanging out with the outcasts, and they form this coven and all this weird shit starts to happen… Trust me, man, you're gonna like it."  
  
Joe snorted, swallowing his food. "Wasn't this, like, some kind of edgy, girl power movie? My cousins were totally into it a few years ago, or something."  
  
"So?"  
  
"So, nothing - I'm just saying: it made a bunch of nerdy fifteen year olds try to be goths."  
  
Patrick snatched the case out of Andy's hand and read it. _The Craft_. The girls on the cover were pretty, there was no denying that. In fact, now he looked at it more closely, he seemed to remember it being in the cinema. He'd never actually seen it, so why not?  
  
"Duck Hunt, get the lights," Pete ordered, as the movie opened on a scene of three girls chanting, surrounded by candles. Patrick watched him climb off the futon, using Patrick's knee for leverage, and then stumble across the room in the light of the TV to fall back down at his side, heavily. Patrick looked over at him and they grinned at each other, noses inches apart.  
  
If nothing else, at least he had Joe half-sitting in his lap and that more than made up for any shitty films he was going to endure tonight.  
  
Two hours later, crawling off the futon to press the eject button to change the film, Andy declared, "I told you it was worth it."  
  
"Well, the effects are better on _Pong_ , but it was okay," Joe told him. "Kind of made me think of that weird store you like, dragged us into, earlier."  
  
"Me too," Patrick nodded, feeling the cold of the room settle in where Joe's warmth had disappeared when he got to his feet to walk out to the kitchen and pick up the next round of snacks. He kicked the door back open with a bottle of rootbeer between each finger of one hand and a bowl of Hallowe'en M&Ms in the other, glancing away from Patrick as he put the bowl on the floor between his feet and Pete's to hand out the bottles. "The main girl was kind of cute. I like red heads."  
  
Patrick's heart skipped a little and sank. He'd seen her in other stuff, it wasn't even her natural colour. "I thought the dude she cast the spell on was hot, until he turned out to be a dick."  
  
"But I thought you _like_ dick?" Joe said, feigning confusion and earning himself a kick in the ass as he scrambled back into his seat.  
  
"He doesn't actually know," Pete corrected. "It's still theoretical."  
  
"Fuck you, man." As if he wasn't self-conscious enough about it already…  
  
"Maybe you could do some magic to fix that?" Andy grinned, climbing back on alongside them.  
  
"And you can fuck right off, too."  
  
Pete almost dropped his drink as he sat bolt upright and turned to Patrick with glee in his eyes. "No, wait - Hurley's right!"  
  
"Oh, here we go…"  
  
"I'm serious - we should do it! We should try that shit from the film! Magic, or whatever - see if that helps give us the boost we need to make the album sell."  
  
"You are out of your mind," Patrick informed him, flatly.  
  
"Have you come up with anything better?"  
  
"Better than some kind of hocus pocus?"  
  
"It has to be worth a shot, kind of - I mean, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. Nobody has to know."  
  
Andy chewed thoughtfully on a couple of Jujubes, the blue light from the TV casting eerie shadows on his face, and said, "Well, there could be _something_ in it. There was a time when a lot of very cool people - writers and artists and stuff - really got into the occult. I mean, I'm talking Victorian London, but there must have been more to it than dressing up in robes and being creepy."  
  
"I'm gonna be a Jedi, if we're like, becoming wizards," Joe announced, trying and failing to catch an M &M in his mouth. "Also totally rocking the robe."  
  
"Well, you guys can do whatever you want, but tomorrow, I'm gonna go back to that store, or whatever, and I'm gonna see what that old dude can sell me."  
  
And that was why, at lunchtime the next day, Patrick found himself pushing aside the wooden beads behind the door of the little bookshop and following Pete inside.  
  
The bearded man didn't look like he'd moved since they walked out the day before. The store still smelled the same, but some kind of chant was playing softly in the background. It reminded him of the Native American performance group he'd seen at the state fair, once. It was beautiful and haunting and ran a tingle up his spine, the drumming slightly hypnotic.  
  
"So… you got anything that helps with success, kind of?"  
  
Pete was leaning both elbows on the counter, talking to the bearded man behind it.  
  
"Probably," the man said. "You'll have to be more specific than that."  
  
"Well, the thing is, we're a band, right? And we could kind of do with a little extra support, or whatever. Something to light a fire under the sales of the album we just put out, you know what I mean?"  
  
The man nodded slowly, a glint in his eye that made Patrick's stomach flip.  
  
"We're not looking for any old hokum, though, man - this is serious."  
  
"Dealing with magic should always be serious. It's not something that should be entered into lightly, or you'll do more harm than good. There's power in this universe that is much, much bigger than you or I could ever comprehend. When you begin to perform magic, you turn on a light. What comes toward that light might be more than you expect. Do you think you're prepared for that, son?"  
  
"Well," Pete began, carefully, "maybe if we had someone like you to guide us, we'd be better informed."  
  
The man smirked. "My name's Frank, not Yoda."  
  
"Okay, Frank, so maybe you could start us off with a book or something, kind of? Tell us what we need, we'll come back if we need any clarification."  
  
Twenty minutes later, Patrick was laden with bags of coloured candles, jars of incense and a small stone dish to burn them in, an antler-handled ceremonial knife that he was pretty sure Andy was going to lose his shit over, two books and a chalice carved from yew.  
  
He wasn't convinced they needed or could afford any of it, but Pete had listened so intently to everything Frank had to say, that he hadn't had the heart or the energy to suggest that maybe they go away and think about it. Pete spent the evening curled into the easy chair with his books and a fancy new journal, making notes in the light of a white church candle on the windowsill. He'd downloaded some kind of sub-Enya ethereal music from Napster and was listening to it to "focus". Patrick and Joe sat in the kitchen, thighs pressed together under the tiny table, watching him through the door as they ate bowls of cereal.  
  
"Is he really fucking serious about this?" Joe whispered, dipping his spoon in Patrick's bowl to steal a marshmallow from his Lucky Charms and earning himself a smack on the hand with Patrick's spoon.  
  
"I think he is. When he took me to that store, earlier, he was asking all kinds of questions about what meant what, y'know? Like, colours and stuff."  
  
Joe pulled a face. "Well. I guess if he wants to light a few candles and burn some shit and chant a bit, it can't totally _hurt_."  
  
Patrick hmmed, noncommittally. He didn't know the first thing about magic, but he was pretty sure that if he knew anyone who could exploit it, Pete was top of the list. But he had a weird feeling about all of this, something churning in the pit of his stomach, that maybe - just maybe - this time they were dabbling in things that were beyond their ken.  
  
\---  
  
When Andy came over for practice on Wednesday night, Pete met him at the door and told him he didn't need to bring his kit up, because they were doing something else. Standing in his doorway, holding his guitar in one hand and his practice amp in the other, Joe looked across at Patrick, who blinked back at him and shrugged. _No, man, no idea_. Joe sighed exaggeratedly at him and disappeared back into his room to put his things away.  
  
In the middle of the living room floor, Pete had set up a couple of picnic blankets and four cushions, with the wooden chopping board from the kitchen in the middle. At the centre was a large, white candle on a plate. Around it, were the antler knife and scattered piles of sage leaves. The only reason Patrick even recognised them was because his grandma had a plant in the garden and put it in pork stuffing.  
  
"We're doing it tonight?" he asked, feeling Joe step up close behind him to peer into the room over his shoulder.  
  
"Woah."  
  
"We're not doing _it_ tonight. Tonight we're finding our mojo, or whatever."  
  
"A little warning would have been nice," Andy complained, dumping his bass drum behind the door. "I had to dismantle this whole thing!"  
  
"Quit bitching, man, if we figure this out, you'll never have to set up your own kit ever again."  
  
After twenty minutes of gathering drinks and catching up, Pete herded them into the living room and pulled a compass and a piece of paper with a diagram on it out of his pocket. He pushed Patrick with his fingertips until he was standing in front of the grubby green cushion on the floor, then stepped in front of the red one opposite. He grabbed Andy by the wrist and pulled him in front of a blue cushion that Patrick had never seen before, leaving a mustard colour one free for Joe. But Andy pulled his hand away and stepped across to the yellow one.  
  
"Are you serious? Did you even read about this stuff?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"Joe? _Air_? Are you kidding me?"  
  
"I resent that!" Joe complained, before uncertainly adding, "I… assume."  
  
"Dude, you're so water you're practically dripping."  
  
"What does that even mean?" Patrick asked. "And why the hell am I standing here?"  
  
"You're Earth!" Pete and Andy snapped simultaneously.  
  
"But why? I don't know what the fuck is going on!"  
  
"You're Earth," Andy explained slowly. "Steadfast, consistent - "  
  
"Stubborn as fuck," Pete added.  
  
" - our greatest resource."  
  
"And why's Joe Water, then?"  
  
"Because he's mercurial and constantly in motion and - okay, imagine white water - like a stream or something?"  
  
"Right…?"  
  
"Well, you can't catch it, right? You can get a little in your hands for a minute, but then it's gone."  
  
That _definitely_ sounded like Joe to Patrick, based on his experience. For all the times he thought opportunity was looming on the horizon, never once had it come through for him.  
  
"I kind of don't get it, but I'll just like, go with the flow or whatever," Joe shrugged.  
  
Patrick grinned at him. "Good one."  
  
"Huh?"  
  
"Go with the flow? Water?"  
  
"Oh! Hah. Yeah."  
  
Pete smacked Joe in the shoulder impatiently. "Would you two _try_ to take this seriously? I put a lot of effort into this!"  
  
"What're you hitting me for?! He made the joke!"  
  
"Okay," Patrick nodded, taking a deep breath and trying to sound serious. "So, what are you?"  
  
"Fire."  
  
"Well, that stands to reason."  
  
"It's not about setting fire to things," Andy told them, rolling his eyes. "It's passion, motivation, leadership -"  
  
"I dunno, bro, Patrick's pretty passionate…" Joe shrugged. "Maybe he should be Fire."  
  
"- and as much as it pains me to say this, Pete is our leader."  
  
"Speak for yourself," Patrick muttered. "And what are you?"  
  
"Air. Knowledge. Intuition. Functions of the higher mind."  
  
"So, how come that _isn't_ me?" Joe asked, quirking an eyebrow at him.  
  
"You honestly want me to answer that?"  
  
It was quite plain that Pete was reaching the end of his tether and that he was either about to stomp off and write a cryptic LiveJournal post because no one was taking him seriously, or he was going to start a brawl.  
  
"Alright. So. What now?" Patrick asked.  
  
Without answering, Pete sat down on his cushion and waved at them all to follow suit.  
  
"We're going to cast a circle, right?" Andy asked. "Before we start?"  
  
"Yes. But can I fucking explain, first?"  
  
"Okay, okay - I was just checking…"  
  
From what Patrick could gather, from Pete's description of what was going to happen and the scrap of paper which his instructions on it, they were going to meditate. Which all seemed like a lot of trouble to do something his drama teacher had made them do for five minutes at the start of every lesson.  
  
"So, hold hands," Pete said, when he'd decided that everyone was ready.  
  
Patrick held out his hand for Joe to take, watching him rub his sweaty palm on the thigh of his trackpants before lightly placing it over Patrick's. He didn't bother with the hand he gave to Pete. Patrick smiled at him encouragingly and wrapped his fingers around Joe's, trying not to think about what they were doing or concentrate on the fact that his heart was starting to race a little.  
  
"Okay, Hurley: you're up."  
  
Andy took a deep breath. "I call the guardians of the watchtower of the East - the element of Air. Bring us your powers of intuition, knowledge and insight. Your wisdom and imagination. We bid you hail and welcome."  
  
"Hail and welcome," the three of them echoed.  
  
Pete followed, calling the guardians of the South and the element of fire with its powers of transformation and the guiding beacon of its light.  
  
Joe cast Patrick an uncertain sidelong glance and cleared his throat to read from the scrap of paper balanced on his crossed ankles. "I call the guardians of the watchtower of the West - the element of Water. Bring us your powers of, um… healing and fluidity… the power of intuition and ability change course. We bid you hail and, uh, welcome, dudes."  
  
Pete narrowed his eyes at him, but said nothing other than his echoed 'hail and welcome'.  
  
"So," Patrick began, rattling through his notes as quickly as he could. "I call the guardians of the watchtower of the North - the element of Earth. Bring us your powers of stability and permanence. Your powers of endurance and abundance. We bid you hail and welcome."  
  
Pete got to his feet and walked around them clockwise, dropping a dusting of salt from the shaker on to the floor. Joe watched him, horrified. "You'd better fucking be the one to vacuum that back up after we're done, dude."  
  
"Shh. I cast this circle as a space of peace and protection through which no ill will shall pass."  
  
He sat back down and folded his legs, taking a long, slow breath. "Okay. We're gonna start out with a meditation. I want you to think about your element and what it means, and how you can kind of like, embody it, yeah? Imagine that those things are running in your veins. When we come back down, we're gonna talk about what we learned, or whatever, and we're gonna do a kind of taster spell to see what happens. Something with a quick turn around, okay? We need to be able to measure it."  
  
"That's cool, but like, how do you start a meditation?" Joe asked, looking around at the three of them, as if he thought they all knew.  
  
"If you wait, I'll guide you," Pete replied, shifting his weight on the cushion. "Everyone get as comfortable as you can in this position."  
  
"My back already hurts…"  
  
"In a minute you'll be thinking about other stuff, okay? Just close your eyes and _focus_."  
  
"Also," Andy added, "you two don't still need to be holding hands."  
  
"Oh." Patrick felt his face warm a little and carefully loosened his fingers from Joe's. "Sorry."  
  
"I don't mind…"  
  
"Everybody close your fucking eyes and stop flirting with each other!"  
  
"I'm not flirting!" Patrick snapped defensively, eyes already shut. He opened his right one just a little and looked around the circle. Andy was sitting up straight, chin perfectly level, breathing even. Pete's head was slightly inclined, his shoulders slowly relaxing. Joe's eyes were closed, but he was frowning, his head dipped and his shoulders dropped. Maybe he really wasn't into doing this at all.  
  
"Listen to my voice. Take a long, slow breath and feel the floor beneath you. Acknowledge it, and let it go. Take a long, deep breath and acknowledge the sounds around you - the traffic in the street outside, the refrigerator in the kitchen - and let it go. Concentrate on breathing deeply and evenly and let every muscle in your body relax - from the top of your head, through your face, and neck, down your arms and back, through your thighs, down to your toes. Let any negativity flow out of you and evaporate into the aether."  
  
This wasn't so hard. This, he could do.  
  
"Now, I want you to imagine that you're outside - you're out in nature, somewhere that reflects your element. I want you to spend some time exploring your surroundings, making a mental note of the smells and the sounds and the things you can see. If you meet someone, remember them and ask them - in your mind - for any messages they have for you. Don't open your eyes or speak, or disturb anyone else."  
  
Patrick took another slow breath and tried to clear his mind. Almost instantly, he found himself standing in a forest, the trees were huge and old, bare - moss growing up their trunks - the air smelled of fallen leaves and soil but the ground was frozen with frost. It was misty and chill and he could hear a waterfall somewhere nearby. Immediately, instinctively, he thought _Joe_ , and set off towards it. The bubbling water sounded like his laughter; the low, delighted chuckle he gave when he was happy. There was a small, babbling brook winding its way through the tree roots, so Patrick followed it, realising his feet were socked and muddy, but not cold. He could feel the moss and the leaves slippery under his toes. As he walked, the brook grew into a stream, and the stream grew into a small river, until the land fell away in front of him, and rocks jutted out from the soil, the water cascading over them. He stepped up to the edge, strangely unafraid of the height that would usually have paralysed him with terror, and looked down.  
  
There, in the pool amongst the froth was Joe, treading water and looking back up at him.  
  
"Dude, I've been waiting for you."  
  
"You have?"  
  
"For ages. Come down!"  
  
"How?"  
  
"You have to jump."  
  
"I can't."  
  
"It's okay, man, I've got you!"  
  
Patrick looked around, at the trees below - some of the leaves were still green, most turning yellow and red and fluttering as they fell. It was still fall, here. He twisted and looked behind him, but the trees that way were just as bare as before.  
  
"If you jump, I'll catch you, I promise!"  
  
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. He trusted Joe, but swimming was never his thing. He wasn't good at it, he didn't like it and he didn't know if he could do it after jumping off a cliff into a lagoon.  
  
Still, he steadied himself and looked down at the water below him. "Alright." Nervously, he lifted one foot and held it out over thin air, feeling himself tip forward into nothing.  
  
Pete's voice broke his fall. "Okay. When you're ready, say goodbye to anybody you met, and feel yourself coming back to the physical plane."  
  
Patrick's eyes opened instantly, and snapped across to Joe. Joe's eyes were also wide open, his pupils dilated in the dim candle light. He was staring straight at Patrick, his cheeks flushed. Somehow Patrick knew, without either of them saying anything, that whatever had just happened was supremely fucking weird.  
  
Pete was grinning before his eyes opened. His teeth glinting in the flickering orange.  
  
"That was _awesome_."  
  
Andy was still sitting with his eyes closed, a sedate smile on his lips. He nodded slightly and blinked, returning to the room.  
  
"So, we're gonna go over what just happened," Pete said, "I wanna know what you saw, or if you got any messages or anything, kind of."  
  
"Uh. What if I don't want to share it?" Joe asked, awkwardly.  
  
"You have to, it's the whole point!"  
  
Andy looked at him, curiously. "Joe? You okay?"  
  
"Yeah, but…"  
  
"I think…" Patrick cleared his throat and started again, reaching out to put a hand on Joe's shoulder, feeling it tense under his fingers. "Dude: waterfall?"  
  
He blushed furiously in response and nodded, gazing down at the candle in front of them.  
  
"I think our meditation things might have overlapped a little."  
  
"Holy shit!" Pete gasped. "Are you serious?!"  
  
"Yeah. I was in a forest and I could hear a waterfall, so I walked towards it and at the bottom, Joe was hanging out in the water. It's no big deal." He let his hand drop from Joe's shoulder, back to his own lap, not really sure it was as true for Joe as it was for him.  
  
"Did you say anything to each other, or whatever?"  
  
"He told me to come down to the lake. Nothing interesting."  
  
Joe looked over at him, sidelong, and gave him a small, grateful smile.  
  
"Oh. Well, that's a total waste of time, thanks."  
  
Patrick tried not to catch Andy's eye; he could feel the weight of his gaze and he had an uncomfortable feeling he wasn't convinced by Patrick's version of the truth.  
  
"What about you, Hurley?"  
  
"It was peaceful," Andy said, thoughtfully. "A raven came to me."  
  
"Did it say anything?"  
  
"Well, no, bro - it was a raven. But it stayed with me while I sat in a tall tree, watching over the treetops. I could feel the breeze in my face. It was beautiful."  
  
Pete looked dubious. "I was walking through a wildfire. But it was alright, kind of? I didn't feel afraid or anything. The fire wasn't gonna burn me, like I was part of it, or something. There were animals running past me, though - like they were trying to get away."  
  
"So, wait - are we saying we all wound up in the woods?" Patrick asked.  
  
One by one, the others seemed to think about it, and slowly nodded.  
  
"Well, that's a good sign, right? It must mean we're all on the same page, y'know?"  
  
"Some of us more than others," Pete noted, watching Joe pick at the skin on the side of his nails, nervously. "You two ought to make something of that. See if it happens again."  
  
Joe looked up at him sharply but said nothing.  
  
"What are we doing next?" Patrick asked, trying to change the subject. He had a feeling that Joe was one misstep away from bolting and swearing off anything magical ever again, and now that they'd started, Patrick was kind of getting into it. He was curious as to what exactly Joe had seen, ever so slightly hopeful.  
  
"Okay, so, next we're gonna do a little spell." Pete pulled some small squares of card out of his hoodie pocket and handed them all pens. "I need you to write down something you want on these. Make it simple, right? No 'world peace' bullshit. Stuff that could happen and you'd know, kind of. Something reasonable. This is our fucking litmus test. Oh - and don't go wishing for a bigger dick or anything, because you're gonna have to ask for it out loud in a second."  
  
"Well - like what, though, dude?" Joe asked, hopelessly. "I wasn't exactly, like, _prepared_ for this."  
  
"So, what do you want, that could happen?"  
  
Patrick shrugged and pressed the button on the top of his pen. "I'm gonna ask for a payrise."  
  
"Yeah, that's fine - that could work."  
  
"I think I'm just gonna ask for a sign, you know?" Andy added. "I want to know that whatever's out there is okay with us doing this."  
  
"You want to ask for permission, bro? What kind of fucking anarchist asks for permission to do subversive shit like this, man?"  
  
"An anarchist who thinks fucking with powers greater than he is, is a great time to be polite about it."  
  
"He's got a point," Patrick said, carefully adding 'please' to his note.  
  
"Well, I'm asking to be the name on everybody's lips, this weekend," Pete told them, smugly, writing his request in careless slashes. "Joe. Choose something, bro."  
  
"But…" Joe spread his hands, looking down at the blank square on his knee, the pen wound between his fingers. "I don't… Like, I don't know what to ask for?"  
  
"What about a new computer so you can give me your old one?" Andy grinned optimistically.  
  
"There's gotta be something you want, man, seriously!"  
  
"Not that I want to talk about in front of you assholes."  
  
Pete arched an eyebrow at him, "Oh yeah?"  
  
"What about - " Patrick twirled his pen in his fingers, focusing on it intently, wondering how hard this was going to backfire on him "- if there's maybe someone you're into, or something like that?"  
  
"How much of an idiot do you think I am, dude?" Joe demanded, jerking his thumb at Pete. "I'm not giving him that kind of ammunition!"  
  
"Oh. Sorry."  
  
"Honestly, little bro, I don't even fucking care, right now. I just want you to pick something, so we can _get the fuck on with it_."  
  
Joe gazed at the ceiling for inspiration, his mouth open a little. "I… fuck. I don't know - maybe… maybe I could just ask to be happy. I mean, that's what everyone wants, fundamentally, right…?"  
  
"Okay, whatever, man - just write it down."  
  
With a heavy sigh, Joe pulled the lid off his pen with his teeth and carefully wrote out, 'Be happy.' Patrick gave him a sympathetic pat on the arm as he folded up his square of paper. It bummed him out a little that Joe felt he needed a spell to be happy, Joe was a strange mix of melancholy and whimsy and unbridled optimism; he never really believed that he was anything other than happy, though.  
  
Joe held up his folded note between his fingers and looked at Pete, determinedly. "And?"  
  
"Now, we ask for it." Pete cleared his throat. "Repeat after me: mark, O spirits, hear my plea, bring that which I desire to me." He nodded to Andy, who stated his request and held his paper into the flame, placing the burning scraps on the piles of leaves on the plate. One by one, they followed suit, the room starting to fill with the smell of scorched sage.  
  
They watched the paper and leaves turn to ash, in silence, the flames melting the edges of the wax on the pillar candle until they burned down to nothing. It had a strangely spiritual feeling, for Patrick. He didn't entirely know what they were really expecting to achieve, or if any of it was going to work, but for the time they weren't bickering, it had been an oddly calming and pleasant experience.  
  
He followed Pete's lead as they thanked the spirits and sent them on their way and then dismantled their invisible circle. It may have been the power of suggestion, but it seemed almost that the room felt different, afterwards. Less full, somehow, even when they all crammed themselves onto the futon with drinks and contemplated their work.  
  
It was later that night, when Andy had left and Pete was in his room, talking to his his girlfriend on the phone, that Joe appeared in Patrick's doorway. His arms were tucked across his stomach, his shoulder propped against the frame. Patrick pulled his headphones off and smiled at him, puzzled.  
  
"Hey. You okay?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"D'you need anything?"  
  
"No… I just." He stood up straighter and stepped in a little. "Thanks. For earlier."  
  
"For what?"  
  
Joe looked over his shoulder, out towards Pete's door, and pushed the door almost closed behind himself. "For the meditation thing."  
  
"Oh." Patrick shifted to encourage him to sit down on the bed, next to him. "It's fine, dude, I just told the truth."  
  
"Did you?"  
  
"Well, it was an abridged version, y'know? But it was what happened."  
  
Pausing for a second, Joe hovered by the door, and then moved over to perch on the end, one of his knees pulled up to his chest. "The thing is, dude, you were asking _me_ to come to _you_. 'Come out of the water' and stuff."  
  
"You were telling me to jump into the water," Patrick told him. "I didn't know what it meant or anything, I just thought that you wanted to hang out."  
  
Joe nodded, slowly. "I guess that was it."  
  
"Did it freak you out or something, dude? You seemed kind of uncomfortable when we came back out of it."  
  
Joe nodded and looked like he wanted to say something else, but closed his mouth, frowning at nothing.  
  
"Do you think Pete was right? That maybe we should try it again?" Patrick tried, hoping Joe would agree. Aside from being curious about what might happen in their strange little mind meld world, he sort of hoped hanging out and doing intense stuff like this together might help his cause.  
  
"I don't know, dude, maybe."  
  
"Well, I'm down. I'm pretty sure we don't need to go through all the salty crap to meditate, it's just a case of sitting down quietly and getting in the zone, y'know? We used to have to do it in one of my high school classes."  
  
"Okay…."  
  
"Good. Cool. I mean, I think it'll be interesting, if nothing else, y'know? See if it was a coincidence."  
  
Joe nodded again.  
  
"So… what did you make of the whole thing tonight?"  
  
"I dunno, man, it all felt a little dumb until that happened."  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"I kind of wish I'd thought of something else, for my spell thing."  
  
"If it works, maybe you can choose something else next time. 'Cause you know that if this works, he won't want to stop and we're going to end up a frickin' black metal band or something, writing odes to Odin."  
  
Patrick was pleased to see the laugh spread across Joe's face. It changed the atmosphere entirely and Joe shifted to sit beside him, legs spread down the bed, almost ankle to ankle save for the height difference.  
  
"So, what do we do when Pete, like, invokes God and becomes an all-powerful nut?" Joe asked seriously.  
  
"I don't know, dude. Maybe we should ask Frank."  
  
"Frank?"  
  
"Old guy from the bookstore."  
  
"Oh. What else do you think we can use this stuff for?"  
  
"Depends if it works. We might get a fat lot of nothing out of it."  
  
"Except an apartment that smells like weed, now."  
  
"Except that," Patrick grinned.  
  
\---  
  
The next morning, when Patrick arrived at work, his manager took him into the office and told him their supervisor had been in a car wreck and was going to be in hospital for months. Patrick stared at the brand new name badge being held out to him, with 'Supervisor' printed under it, and felt a little sick.


	2. The Air Was Full

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **WARNING:** There is a brief and non-graphic reference in this fic to drawing blood for ritual purposes. If you do not wish to read this description, skip the short paragraph after the words 'testing the water'

**The Air Was Full**  
 _Believe that life can change, that you're not stuck in vain_  
  
  
When Patrick got home that night, he wasn't sure if he'd rather be alone to wallow in his guilt at what he felt sure he'd inadvertently caused, or desperate for company, so that he didn't have to dwell on it. He took off his coat and threw it into his room, then wandered into the living room to see if Joe was sitting there, playing on his Playstation, like he usually was. He was disappointed to find that tonight, he wasn't.   
  
Despondently, he opened the fridge, hoping to feel inspired by one of the ready meals. He closed it again, still feeling queasy, and decided to see if Pete was home. It was Pete who'd appreciate this information more than anyone else. He was pretty sure that Pete would consider it evidence of a hard victory.  
  
He was standing at Pete's door, about to knock, when Joe appeared, looking like he'd just woken up. His increasingly wild curls were a mess and he had creases from the pillow all down one cheek.  
  
"He went out," Joe mumbled, rubbing his face. "You okay, dude?"  
  
Patrick exhaled heavily, almost ready to collapse in a deflated heap. "Oh, Joe - I've had the worst day, man."  
  
"How come?" Joe asked, suddenly more alert, his hand finding it's way to Patrick's shoulder comfortingly, rubbing at the seam on his plaid shirt.  
  
"I got promoted."  
  
At first, Joe looked confused, like he wasn't completely sure he was awake, yet. "But…?" Then the realisation seemed to sink in. "Your pay rise?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Dude."  
  
"I fucking know, right?" Patrick said, and the sick feeling was fading away under the rush of disbelief and frustration, like at last he could share this completely insane and unacceptable turn of events with someone who'd understand. "And you know why I got a promotion, man?" He didn't wait for Joe to respond. "Because my actual supervisor, Ian, is in the hospital. He's in the damn hospital because last night, he decided to go to a bar and drive home."  
  
" _Dude_."  
  
"So, now I'm supervisor and I get an extra two dollars an hour, and that was _so not what I meant_."  
  
Joe didn't even seem to know what to say. He just patted him on the shoulder, heavily. "Well… I mean, technically, it worked, dude."  
  
" _Yeah_ , but -"  
  
"And it's not like he didn't bring it on himself, if he was drunk, basically."  
  
"But what if he wouldn't have, if -?"  
  
"Honestly, man, we did that whole thing last night - when would these guardian dudes even have time to make that happen? It has to be, like, a really weird coincidence or something."  
  
Patrick sighed, grateful for Joe's uncharacteristically pragmatic perspective. "Maybe you're right."  
  
"Of course, dude, I'm like, _Mr Right_ , or something." It took a second for Joe to realise what he'd said, and by that time Patrick was blushing. He pulled a face. "Or not."   
  
Patrick laughed, nervously, and they stood in awkward silence for a moment until Joe asked:  
  
"Did you eat?"  
  
"Not yet, I kind of couldn't stomach anything I have, to be honest."  
  
"You want to get take out or something? I'll buy you dinner to make you feel better if you want…"  
  
"Thanks, dude, but you don't need to do that - "  
  
"I know I don't, but I still have the money my parents gave me for my birthday, and I kind of need some help spending it or something."  
  
By the time Patrick went to bed, that night, he was feeling a lot better about everything. Maybe it was a coincidence or maybe Ian was a goddamn idiot who was lucky the only person he screwed over was himself. Joe had told him it was probably confirmation bias, anyway: he was looking for it, so he assumed that the two things were connected when it did happen.  
  
When he fell asleep, he dreamed of the forest, making his way straight to Joe's waterfall and laying down on the rocks to watch him floating peacefully in the water, unseen.  
  
  
\---  
  
They had a show that Friday. The Metro was one of their favourite venues, because it felt like a real show, rather than standing in a corner of a room that looked like a run down gym hall. They may only be the second band on the bill, but it made them feel lucky to be playing there at all.   
  
The problem was, four songs into their nine song set, as Pete balanced on the edge of the stage, clasping his mic in both hands and screaming down at the front row, he tipped. Patrick watched it happen in slow motion, the frantic flail for purchase - something, _anything_ to steady himself - but there was nothing. The wide open stage ran straight into the crowd, which parted like the the red sea and swallowed him whole.  
  
Patrick and Joe looked at each other, trying to keep playing, because surely he'd resurface in a second and crowd surf back to the stage - except the kids down the front were all bowing down, scrambling to lift him to his feet. Pete was out cold.  
  
\---  
  
"Well, his spell thing worked," Joe told Patrick around a piece of toast, sitting cross-legged in his pyjamas at his computer desk.  
  
"It did?" Patrick asked. He'd fallen asleep face down in Joe's room when they stumbled in from the emergency room after 3am. Andy was presumably in Pete's, monitoring his concussion. After getting him through the door and sending him to bed, Joe had gone on the band's website and posted a message to let people know he was fine. Patrick had collapsed on the bed, exhausted, intending to help him word the message and falling asleep before the desktop had even fully booted up. Now, he was under the covers, fully dressed, and confused.   
  
Joe waved his toast at the screen.   
  
"We got replies, dude."  
  
Squinting and putting on his glasses, he clambered down to the bottom of the bed and looked over Joe's shoulder. The band's email inbox was flooded with notifications.  
  
\---  
  
"Well, if we've learned anything," Andy told them, seriously, "it's that we need to be specific. We've been too general. In the module on folklore, in my course, there was a lot of interesting stuff about intent and mischief. If something went wrong, people would blame it on faeries and bad spirits who they thought would fuck with people for fun. I kind of wonder if this is the same principle."  
  
"Well, what happened to yours?" Patrick asked.   
  
"Well, there have been a couple of things which were sort of interesting. You know how I had a raven in my vision? Next morning, I was washing the dishes for my mom, and one landed right at the window. It sat there, kind of looking at me, so I threw a few pieces bread out on the back porch. When I went to take out the trash, later, I found this, right where I put the bread." He pulled a shiny, amber coloured glass bead from his pocket. "Look at the colour."  
  
"Yellow. For air," Pete said, reaching out to touch it.  
  
"Exactly."  
  
"What was the other thing?"  
  
"Less cool: I was driving home at like 2am, and a fox ran out in front of me, and just stopped and looked me in the eye. Just stood there. And then it ran off. Which could mean nothing, because they do that all the time, I guess…"  
  
"I mean, _I'd_ take that as approval, kind of."  
  
"What about you, dude?" Patrick asked, tugging on one of Joe's curls, gently.  
  
"I still think this could all be a coincidence," Joe said, from where he was sitting on the floor, propped against the futon and Patrick's leg.  
  
"Dude, are you actually fucking serious?" Pete demanded, laughing. "Were you even there last night?"  
  
"Sure. I watched your ass nosedive off a stage and fuck up our best show."  
  
"Hey - people are gonna fucking remember my name now, though, right?"  
  
Patrick rolled his eyes, because of course Pete would consider a disaster a total success.   
  
"We should try some of the _really_ cool stuff, next."  
  
"Next time, instead of 'I want a payrise,' it has to be 'I would like to be rewarded for my hard work and commitment with a reasonable increase in pay.' You can't leave room for interpretation," Andy said, seriously. "We can't get anyone caught up in the crossfire."  
  
"I'm talking, like, levitating shit, like they did in the movie."  
  
"Pete, it was a movie. You cannot seriously believe - ?"  
  
"Don't know 'til we've tried it, bro."  
  
And that was how, ten minutes of arguing later, Patrick found himself laying on the living room floor, still complaining that this was a ridiculous idea. As it turned out, he was right. They were no more able to levitate him than they were to juggle water, but as the other three crouched around him, Joe's fingers wedged under his hip and his thigh, Pete's under his shoulders and Andy's at his ankles, whispering "light as a feather, stiff as a board" there was a sudden crash and the sound of ceramic shattering on the kitchen floor.  
  
They all scrambled to their feet, rushing to the doorway to see, Andy ahead of them all, bracing his hands against the doorframe to stop them all shredding their feet to pieces on the dish rack of crockery spread across the linoleum floor. A dish rack of crockery that was _six feet_ across the floor from the draining board it had started out on.  
  
"How the fuck…?" Pete murmured.  
  
"Dude. There's no way."  
  
"Of course there's a way," Andy replied carefully, stepping into the room on tiptoes to avoid the shards and turning around to look for reasons the collection of mugs and dishes may have met their end. "Maybe they were stacked poorly."  
  
"Hey, fuck you - I do an awesome job of stacking that thing!" Joe complained, and they all knew that Joe was the only one who ever bothered to wash up, so there was no one else to blame.  
  
Later, after they'd spent hours debating the potential causes of ar-mug-geddon, and found themselves with no more solid an explanation than when they started, Pete left to be fussed over by his girlfriend and Andy went to hang out with their other friends for a while before heading back to Milwaukee. Neither Patrick nor Joe had felt inclined to join them. It had been a long weekend already, and it was only Saturday evening.  
  
Instead, they sat together on the broken futon, propped shoulder to shoulder with one of Pete's books on their knees, browsing through the lists of correspondences and diagrams of magical symbols. Nowhere did it mention shared meditations, which was a little disappointing. They resorted to the internet for advice, perched together on Joe's desk chair, and found nothing more than theoretical forum posts there, either.  
  
"Maybe we should just, like, try it again?" Joe suggested, when they reached the tenth page of search results.  
  
Patrick's stomach fluttered. "I mean… we could."  
  
"Pete thinks we should."  
  
"Oh, well if _Pete_ thinks so," he grinned, watching a self-conscious smile creep across Joe's face.  
  
Joe got to his feet, the chair almost tipping as it unbalanced, and wiped both of his palms on his jeans. He went to his CD collection and dug out a copy of the Fellowship of the Ring OST. "Will this do for background noise?"  
  
Patrick couldn't quite suppress a snigger. "Yeah, I guess?"  
  
"If we're gonna keep doing this, I could like, invest in something authentic, if you want?"  
  
"We're good, man," Patrick assured him, getting up and waiting for Joe to light the jar candle on his dresser and climb onto the bed before he followed, sitting opposite him, cross legged. They looked at each other nervously, not really sure what to do.  
  
"Do we need to hold hands, or…?"  
  
"We could," Patrick offered. "I don't think it's strictly necessary, y'know, but it might help us stay kind of grounded… or like, connect or something."  
  
Before he'd even finished his sentence, Joe hands were in front of him, palms upturned. Patrick smiled a little, shifting them knee to knee, their toes pressed together awkwardly, just so that he could reach out to hold them. It quickly became clear that this wasn't going to be comfortable, but after much self-conscious fumbling, they settled with legs spread like ragdolls, Patrick's laid over the top of Joe's.  
  
"Pete can never hear of this," Joe informed him seriously, picking up Patrick's hands and holding them in their laps, his eyes already closed.  
  
Patrick nodded, biting his lip so hard it hurt, because it was Joe - just Joe, who he slept next to in the van and practically sat on his lap on the futon and didn't kick him out when he fell asleep in his bed still sweaty and gross after shows - but he didn't think any amount of meditation was going to get his heartrate down after this.  
  
"I'll meet you at the waterfall," Joe said, as if there was any doubt.  
  
When Patrick opened his eyes in the other world, he was sitting on the rocks at the top, his feet dangling over the edge. He looked down into the water for Joe, and was surprised to find he wasn't there. Aside from the bubbling of the water rushing into the pool, there was nothing.  
  
"Joe?" he yelled, looking around at the shore, starting to think that Joe hadn't made it through, yet. Worrying that maybe it was all a coincidence, that there was no weird mind meld going on at all. He climbed to his feet, wondering how best to get down to the lake so he could look for him properly. "JOE?"  
  
The hand on his shoulder was warm in the chilly air. "I'm right here, dude." Joe was standing next to him, ankle-deep in the flowing river, balancing precariously on a submerged rock. "I was waiting."  
  
"You said that last time," Patrick told him, realising that he was soaked through and ice crystals were beginning to form on the threads of torn denim across his knees. "Aren't you cold?"  
  
"Not really," Joe shrugged. "Last time you told me to come out, and the others aren't here, so… I'm out."  
  
Patrick blinked and looked around them. He didn't really know what that meant.   
  
"So… what now?"  
  
The seasons hadn't changed at all, the leaves were still falling from the trees below them, but they didn't seem to be getting any less laden.  
  
"Maybe we should like, explore or something?"  
  
Joe's feet were bare as he used Patrick's shoulders to steady himself and stepped out onto the frozen earth of the riverbank. The water dripped from his clothes and sank into the soil as they made their way through the trees. He didn't know where they were going on how they'd find their way back, but it was okay - he felt safe. The light breeze rustling through the remaining leaves in the treetops was comforting.   
  
As they walked, the ground seemed to slowly defrost, crocuses pushing up through the moss around them. In the trees, birds seemed to be nesting, the hacking squawk of carrion carrying through the forest around them.  
  
Before long, they emerged from the trees on a cliff edge, the land falling away in front of them to charred spears of burnt out tree trunks. The earth was blackened and the air smelled acrid, tasted bitter on Patrick's tongue.  
  
"Pete?" he whispered, scanning the landscape for any trace of flame or smoke, any sign of life under the vivid summer sun.  
  
"Everything's destroyed. What the fuck did he do?"  
  
"It wasn't him, it couldn't have been."  
  
"Dude, he's Fire. If this is the place we all go, then what else was it?"  
  
"Sometimes shit just happens, y'know?"  
  
"I don't know - I have a bad feeling about this."  
  
Patrick's eyes opened wide, staring straight into Joe's glinting with yellow light. For a moment he had no idea where he was or what was happening, but then Pete's voice behind him and the feel of Joe yanking his hands out of his grip brought him abruptly back to reality.  
  
"What the fuck are you two even doing?" he was saying, barely contained laughter in his voice.  
  
Joe was scrambling out from under Patrick's legs, pushing him off to get the lamp in the now darkened room. "Don't you ever fucking knock?"  
  
"I'm sorry, did I interrupt something _private_?"  
  
"We were just meditating," Patrick told him, annoyed at the intrusion and a little disoriented.  
  
"What time is it?" Joe asked, holding the empty jar the candle had sat in.  
  
"After midnight, why?"  
  
Patrick looked at the watch on his wrist. _00.11_. "But we started at like, nine or something?"  
  
Joe looked at him darkly, nodding.  
  
\---  
  
"So… you and Duck Hunt…?"  
  
"Were _meditating_ ," Patrick insisted, flopping back on the foot of Pete's bed. Joe had kicked them both out and said he was going to sleep, so Patrick had followed Pete into his room.  
  
"Like, I don't know what books you've been reading, or whatever, but you don't need to sit in his lap to do it, kind of."  
  
"It was the only way we could hold hands!"  
  
"Don't need to do that, either."  
  
"We thought it might help."  
  
"Might help you get laid, maybe."  
  
"Pete, would you just stop? It was totally innocent."  
  
"Oh, totally," Pete smirked at him.   
  
Patrick swung out a fist and thumped him in the hip as he passed. "Leave it alone, asshole."  
  
Pete responded by throwing himself down on the bed, half pinning him to the mattress. "So, when you slept in his bed, last night, what happened then, dude?"  
  
" _Literally_ nothing. I just fell asleep."  
  
"Honestly, I'm disappointed. Such a wasted opportunity! I throw myself onto my skull from a height and you can't even get a handjob out of it. You want me to say something?"  
  
"There's nothing to say!" Patrick lied, blushing fiercely, because the last thing he wanted was for Joe to find out, and the fastest way for your secrets to get out was always to confide them in Pete, even if he swore he'd keep them. Mostly because he thought he'd play the white knight and try to resolve the problem. Patrick had literally never seen it work out for him.  
  
"Go for it, dude, he's not getting any better offers."  
  
Patrick glared at him, both offended and hopeful but abjectly refusing to let Pete know he was either. He changed the subject, instead. "So, do you have a plan or anything?"  
  
"To get you in Trohman's pants?"  
  
"To put the magic to some kind of use, if it's actually working."  
  
Pete shrugged and rolled on to his back, propping himself up on his elbows. "I was gonna put something together for Wednesday night. I thought a kind of a mini road trip or something, this time. Get out into the woods, if that's what we've all been seeing, or whatever."  
  
Patrick nodded against the comforter. "Alright. But we take precautions, this time. We plan ahead, we keep it scripted, okay? I want Andy to go over everything and check it, because I don't want to be responsible for anyone dying or anything."  
  
"Whatever my little Lunchbox wants," Pete assured him.  
  
Gratefully, Patrick shifted and propped his head against Pete's side. "Thanks, man."  
  
They lay together in silence for a minute, before Pete said, "I just really want this to work out, dude."  
  
"I know."  
  
"Maybe I don't have talent like you three, but this is something I can do, maybe, you know?"  
  
"Pete, you have talent. You can write and you know what to do with people, y'know? I can't do that kind of crap, it's all on you. That's your talent."  
  
"Thanks, but still…"  
  
"Joe's right, dude - it might not happen now, and it might not happen tomorrow, or next week or anything, but it'll happen. It has to."  
  
"And it will, if we can master this."  
  
Perhaps that was true, and perhaps playing with candles and chanting and thinking that maybe they were dabbling in the dark arts was kind of cool. But deep down, Patrick still hoped that when someone stood up and took them seriously it would be because they were good, not because they'd used sorcery to win them round.  
  
\---  
  
They didn't talk much about what had happened on Saturday night, afterwards. Joe seemed utterly freaked out and Patrick wasn't sure if it was what he'd seen in the meditation or the fact that Pete had walked in on them sitting in each other's laps and made fun of them.  
  
Joe spent most of Sunday at his parents' house and by the time he got home it was almost ten and Pete had gone to hide in his room, studying his books and scribbling in his journal. Patrick was eating a family pack of potato chips and watching a cut-for-TV version of The Evil Dead in the dark. He was so engrossed that he didn't even hear Joe come in and nearly flew off the futon when he appeared in the doorway, hood still pulled up, silhouetted against the yellow of the street light through the windows.  
  
"Well, that's flattering," Joe snorted, dumping a plastic bag of stuff his mother always sent him home with to make sure he was eating, and dropping onto the folded foam mattress, next to him.  
  
"Sorry, I didn't hear the door."  
  
Joe just shrugged and took a handful of chips out of the bag.  
  
"How's your mom?"  
  
"Motherly."  
  
"And your dad?"  
  
"Dadderly."  
  
"Of course." He grinned over at him, watching Joe carefully lick the flavoured powder off his fingers.  
  
"Where's our roomie?"  
  
"Writing a black mass or something."  
  
"Cool." Joe leaned over to the floor, half dangling from the furniture to drag his bag closer with his fingertips and pull a folded sheet of printer paper from it. "So, I'm gonna like, show you something and I want you to tell me if it means anything to you, okay?"  
  
"Sure," Patrick nodded, putting down his food and dusting his hands off, then rubbing them on his pants.  
  
At first, Joe seemed to hesitate to steel himself, and then shook the paper out and handed it to him. Across the page, scribbled heavily in black ballpoint, was a landscape of jagged edges and thin spikes across rolling hills. Patrick inhaled abruptly, catching a fragment of chip in his throat and descending into a coughing fit, pointing frantically at the paper and nodding vigorously as Joe rubbed at his back, trying to soothe him.  
  
"You know it?"  
  
"It's our forest! Dude, it's what I saw in our forest!"  
  
Joe nodded slowly. "It's what I saw. Half of it burned out."  
  
"It wasn't _half_ , but… yeah. Right before real-Pete ruined it, that's what I saw."  
  
Joe just kept nodding.  
  
"Do you think it means something," Patrick asked. He hadn't been able to shake that thought all day. What if it was a sign? Did it mean Pete or did it mean the effect Pete would have, or an effect on Pete? Was it Pete at all?  
  
"I don't know, dude, but like… can it be a good thing that we go to this awesome place in our heads and like, Pete's part is all fucked up? 'Cause I don't know, basically."  
  
"I don't know either, but y'know, that book of Pete's said something about fire being cleansing and stuff and meaning renewal or something. Maybe? I don't know. I just don't want to think it means something horrible."  
  
Joe sat absorbed in his sketch for a few moments, before finally saying. "Dude, it's just that, like… we live here with him. You see how intense he gets about girls, man - if things get too weird, we need to kind of like, back each other up, yeah?"  
  
"Yeah, of course," Patrick said, rubbing Joe's arm encouragingly. "We'll be Team Sanity. If Pete goes a little over the edge, we'll be there to pull him back up. It'll be fine."  
  
\---  
  
October was in full swing by the fifteenth, leaves scattered the path through Potawatomi Woods, and Patrick kicked through them lightly as they walked away from the parking lot where they'd left Andy's van. Joe was walking just behind his right shoulder, holding a torch in one hand and a metal pail of tinder they'd brought to act as a firepit in the other. Ahead of them Pete was carrying a camping lantern to light the way. Andy seemed half able to see in the dark.  
  
He still couldn't quite believe they were going to do this, even after a rehearsal in the living room the night before, in which Andy had thoughtfully signed off all their work, amending phrasing for clarity as he went. This was either going to be a total failure, a local news item on idiots with out of control campfires in the woods, or the thing that changed the world, for them.  
  
It ran like a military operation: compass out, sigils carefully drawn in the dirt by Andy's artistic hand, tea lights in dollar store packs of earthenware holders demarking the edge of the circle, their bucket-cauldron of fire lit, cast with a handful of incense made of bergamot, sage and patchouli (according to the jar) along with a pinch burning on a charcoal stick in the stone bowl, grape juice in the yew chalice, Joe fully argued through the reasons that yes, they really were going to need to use that knife to cut his finger and yes, it could be his right pinkie if it mattered so damn much and yes they did bring band aids.  
  
With studied care, they cast their circle, inviting the guardians to join them without stutters or 'dudes' or the faintest hint of disrespect. The candles flickered in the breeze whispering around them, casting eerie shadows against the trees surrounding their small clearing. Joe's fingers dug into Patrick's as a particularly sudden gust brought the flames of the fire into a rush of orange, but he didn't break the chant. He closed his eyes tight and kept going. Patrick smiled at him encouragingly, even though he wasn't looking, his mind drifting momentarily to Pete's offer to intervene, wondering if maybe it was the answer, or if there was some other way of testing the water.  
  
He hadn't the time to draw a conclusion, because Pete had produced the antler knife and run it through the flames to sterilise it, and was clutching it carefully, his hand shaking a little as he held Andy's, fingertips exposed. Andy took the knife from his hand and carefully returned the tiny nick, just enough for a droplet to form. Joe didn't let go of Patrick's hand, when he apprehensively offered Pete his right one, and he turned his face away so he didn't have to look. When Patrick’s turn came, he gently untwined his hand from Joe's and offered Pete his own right pinkie. Joe had been right about it being the best choice - he could hold a pick without it. He barely felt it. The blade was sharp and the cut superficial, there'd be no sign of it in a few days.  
  
Pete pulled out a green square of paper, their spell already meticulously inscribed upon it in metallic coppery ink, and held it out for them each to add a droplet to. Then, he folded its corners in, and then again, sealing it up with a few drops of wax from a pumpkin coloured candle.  
  
Patrick pulled the hand trowel from his pocket, knowing it was his big moment, and dug a small hole in the ground. He took the sealed spell from Pete and placed it in the earth, carefully laying a healthy acorn he'd collected on top, before gently filling it in while the others quietly murmured their incantations.   
  
As he stood to rejoin them, arms and eyes cast to the sky, a cluster of four orange shooting stars sliced through the atmosphere. He could hear the hitch of laughter in Pete's voice, knowing the others had seen it, too.  
  
They finished their ritual with sips of the grape juice as a symbol of their shared prosperity and friendship, pouring the rest on to the ground around the disturbed patch and leaving with it offerings of nuts and seeds, things that they thought indicated the potential for growth and might appeal to the animals sharing the woods with them. And then they packed away their candles and equipment, moved the dying fire out of the circle with gloved hands and then kicked leaves back over the bare earth they'd exposed to carry out their work on, hiding the evidence under a blanket of oranges and golds.  
  
For a while, they sat nearby, perched on chunks of felled tree trunk in silence, waiting for the pail to cool enough to be able to carry to the pond and dip in the water so it was safe to take back in the van. Somewhere in the trees, an owl was hooting gently to its mate.  
  
It felt magical. Secret and powerful and almost like a storm was in the air, the atmosphere charged with something. Patrick looked around at the other three - his closest friends and partners in crime. Whatever happened, now, they were bound together in a union of sorcery or stupidity, one or the other, or possibly both. He had a feeling they'd come back here time and again, provided nobody disturbed it.  
  
"So, I just kind of want to say I love you guys, y'know? Even if this goes totally wrong, I still want us to do this band."  
  
They all turned to look at him. Pete grinned with every one of his teeth and barrelled into him from the next log, knocking him to the floor. "Why didn't you say so?! We could be married already!"  
  
Not to be outdone, Joe flopped onto the leaves beside them, kissing Patrick's forehead and tucking his arm around Pete. "I love you assholes, too."  
  
Andy laughed, looking down at them. "You sappy fucks." He dived onto the heap, knocking the air out of all three of them. They let out a collection of squawks and groans through their laughter, and wrapped him up amongst them.  
  
"It's us against the world forever, yeah?" Pete said, bumping his forehead to Andy's ear.  
  
"For fucking _ever_!" Andy agreed.  
  
Joe cheered, "Until one of us winds up in jail!"  
  
"Always," Patrick added. "Except right now someone's on my bladder and I kind of need for that to stop."  
  
Joe wriggled out from under Andy and stood up, almost overbalancing, before holding out a hand to pull him to his feet. Patrick accepted it and reached for the other one, too. He almost rolled to standing and into Joe's arms with a single heave, steadying himself against his shoulders. Joe caught him at the waist and squeezed him tight, before pushing him gently away. "Go pee up a tree like a dog, then, if you need to."  
  
By the time Patrick got back, Andy and Pete were holding the pail using a long stick under the handle, one at each end. They walked down to the pond and dunked it in the water, watching until the steam stopped, then began the walk back to the van. Sitting in the second row, Joe looped his arm around Patrick's and fell asleep on his shoulder. In the rearview mirror, Pete caught Patrick's eye and mimed a blowjob at him until he flipped him off, embarrassed. He shrugged at Joe until he woke up and re-settled against the window.  
  
\---  
  
When he fell into bed, that night, he dreamed of a million paper squares with metallic writing on them, falling like leaves in Joe's corner of the forest. _I don't get it_ , Joe told him, holding soggy fistfuls of paper, frantic and confused. _How am I supposed to know which one to follow?_  
  
\---  
  
It was Friday afternoon, standing in the record store pricing up new stock for the pop section, that Patrick's phone started vibrating in his pocket. He pulled it out to see Pete's name on the screen.   
  
"Dude, I'm at wo -"  
  
"TURN ON THE RADIO!"  
  
"What?"  
  
"DUDE! PUT IT ON WKQX! NOW!"  
  
"NOOOOOOOOW!" Joe's voice yelled in the background. He sounded like he was jumping up and down, his voice wavering excitably.  
  
Patrick walked round the shelves to the radio and turned the dial to 101.1. The handset dropped from his fingers like someone had buttered it. His own voice was playing back at him through the speaker.  
  
\---  
  
So, it was working. It was actually fucking working. There was something in this magic thing and he didn't know how it worked, but it made him wonder what else he could do with it. Whether maybe there was something he could do to make sure that his increasingly tender feelings for Joe wouldn't be rebuffed out of hand if he actually made them known. The thing was, none of them even knew what Joe was into. He made ambiguous comments about all kinds of people all the time, and they'd generally assumed he thought he was being funny when talking about anyone other than girls. Patrick had certainly only ever seen him hit on girls, anyway, and his over all success rate was in the low single figures even then.  
  
Perhaps it was the years of living around Pete and his 'helpful' blabbermouth, but Joe always kept personal stuff private. He didn't bring it up to begin with and he'd laugh it off with nonsense and change the subject if they asked, so eventually they just gave up.   
  
There was room to hope that maybe he was actually open to dating other dudes, but even after Patrick had come out to them all in parking lot in Champaign at two in the morning, last year, it didn't seem to have provoked any desire to open up. The risk of him finding out about Patrick's feelings was too great. What if he was horrified? What if things got awkward and he wouldn't share the futon with him, anymore? If Patrick just had a better idea of his chances, maybe he'd be able to make a better, more informed decision on what to do.   
  
Maybe he could try a truth spell or something. Did those even exist? He knew the CIA used some kind of drug on people, but there was no way he was getting any access to that. Besides, he wasn't sure there was something entirely moral about that route. If Joe wanted to tell him, he would.  
  
What if there was something else, though? Something that might make him more open to the prospect? Some sort of love potion or something, that allowed Patrick to position himself as the obvious choice without actually using magic to specifically cast a spell and make Joe fall in love with him. After all, it had gone horribly wrong in the movie, but that was fiction and this was real life.  
  
He got up early on Saturday and left the house before Joe or Pete was even awake. Frank had changed his shirt, but was otherwise unaltered, when Patrick stepped into the shop.  
  
"Um, hi, Frank."  
  
"Good morning."  
  
Awkwardly, Patrick looked around the store at the shelves, trying to work up the nerve to ask for help because he wasn't sure the old guy wasn't going to laugh him out of the place.  
  
"Where's the Sorcerer's Apprentice, this morning?" Frank asked.  
  
"Pete? He's probably still asleep," Patrick told him, smirking.  
  
"So, what brings you in, this fine October morning?"  
  
Patrick swallowed and tugged his woollen hat off, nervously. "I was kind of looking for something."  
  
"Something specific?"  
  
"Uh. Well, information, I guess."  
  
Frank nodded patiently, waiting for him to elaborate.  
  
"Look, the thing is, I was kind of hoping to improve my situation as pertains to… well, to someone I care for a lot, and I don't know how to go about it."  
  
"I find talking is often a good place to start."  
  
Sighing, Patrick confessed, "See, that sounds great and everything, but he - er… _they_ don't tend to talk about this stuff and I can't afford to get it wrong, y'know? I was kind of hoping there was something I could do that might, I don't know… clear the way a little, maybe."  
  
Frank lifted a hand and beckoned to him. "C'mere."  
  
Patrick wound his way around stacks of books and small display tables to the counter, watching Frank pull a velvet bag out from under the register. Silently, he pulled out a deck of oversized cards and spread them on the surface, rubbing his hand over them until they were thoroughly jumbled up.  
  
"Pick one."  
  
"Any one?"  
  
"Sure."  
  
He reached out and tugged a card from the middle of the spread and handed it out to him. Frank flipped it, side to side and laid it down on top of the others.  
  
"Wheel of Fortune. _Not_ the game show." He winked. "A positive sign, so don't panic."  
  
Patrick nodded and pretended to understand what was happening, but being told not to panic didn't make him feel any more at ease.   
  
"There are certain things happening that you don't have control of, and I suspect that's a little scary for you, huh?"  
  
He nodded again, more vigorously this time.  
  
"Well, sometimes you just have to go with what the Universe gives you and find a way to make the best of it. You're not getting a choice in this one, my young friend. The Universe has something - or somebody - in mind for you."  
  
"Oh."  
  
"In short, don't sweat it. When it happens, you'll know."  
  
"Does it say anything about, y'know… who, or anything?"  
  
"Not this card, no."  
  
"But what if I just really want to know where I stand with this one particular person?"  
  
"Won't matter. If he's for you, he's for you. If he's not, he's not."  
  
None of which really made Patrick feel any better. "I see."  
  
Frank watched him knowingly for a few moments, then sighed and walked around the counter to pull a thin, red book from the shelf. It was old and looked like it was missing its dust jacket. He shoved it into Patrick's hand. "Seeing as you're going to try it anyway, take that."  
  
"Oh. How much do I owe - ?"  
  
"Nothing. It has been on that shelf waiting for the right owner for years."  
  
"Are you sure? I mean, I can pay…"  
  
"Take it. But there are two things you should know: it's frowned upon to cast magic to control people and doing so just might bite you in the ass, and there's a total lunar eclipse in three weeks. Do with that information what you will."  
  
"Wow… I… Thanks. Seriously, thanks."  
  
The old man patted him on the arm. "I'd say 'good luck' but it's already working for you."  
  
\---  
  
When he got home, book tucked safely in his rucksack, Pete was leaning over Joe's shoulders at his computer desk.  
  
"Hey."  
  
"Little dude!" Joe called. "Take a look at this."  
  
Puzzled, Patrick dropped his rucksack and walked into the room to see what they were looking at. "What's up?"  
  
They were looking at Pete's LiveJournal, the friend count of which had hit four figures.  
  
"How many of those do you usually have?"   
  
"Like three hundred or something."  
  
"Wow. Okay."  
  
"This happened since Wednesday."  
  
"Well, that's neat, but it's not getting us in Billboard."  
  
"Are you insane? Of course it is! Every new follower is another voice to spread the word. This means that 1,297 people have actually heard and liked our music, kind of."  
  
"Fair enough. Meanwhile, I'll be in my room, so call me if an actual journo decides to care." He walked out, flipping Pete off in response to his suggestions that he intended to jerk off.  
  
The book was definitely old. The typeface was strange and all the pictures in it looked like etchings. It talked of tinctures and infusions and the only kind of infusion Patrick was familiar with was his mom's herbal teas. He curled up with it propped on his arm and read every single page, then flicked back through it again to try to find the parts that sounded like they might be helpful.  
  
There was a particular spell that was described as 'opening the heart' which seemed like it sort of fitted the bill. The way Patrick looked at it, he wasn't trying to control anyone, he just wanted there to be a chance, or for some opportunity for to find out what Joe was really thinking.   
  
"A month?!" he muttered at the passage detailing the instructions. Seriously? A whole month? He wasn't sure he had a month before this whole thing got too weird. How was he supposed to brew this potion for a whole month without someone getting suspicious? Where would he keep it where it wouldn't turn nasty?  
  
Sighing at the inconvenience, he made his list of ingredients, grateful that the hardest thing to get hold of was likely to be fresh, food grade lavender, and not eye of newt or something horrible. It might be time consuming, but none of this was beyond the realms of possibility. He had to at least try.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Title from Florence + The Machine's song 'Various Storms & Saints'  
> Quote from The Smashing Pumpkins song, 'Tonight, Tonight'_


	3. In Teenage Twilight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promised this chapter a few times over the past year, but it was unfortunately shelved for reasons ranging from TWNW to HB3.
> 
> But here it is, with apologies.
> 
> Happy 1st of Hallowe'en.

**In Teenage Twilight  
** _I'll face my fear of the sunrise when I wake up with your hand inside mine._

 

"Um. Dude, you know Hallowe'en is next Friday, right?" Patrick asked, looking up from his third hour of Simpsons reruns that morning.  
  
Pete's face was adorned with thick, black smudges under his eyes.  
  
"Are we doing The Crow, this year?" Joe asked with a small gasp of glee at the prospect.  
  
Patrick responded by slapping the sole of the socked foot in his lap. "No."  
  
Joe pulled his foot away and pressed it to the side of Patrick's face, despite his best efforts to push him off. "Well, fuck you guys, I'm doing the make up even if you won't."  
  
"Looks like Pete's way ahead of you, man."  
  
"I told you that film turns people into goths…"  
  
"It's a look," Pete informed them, archly.  
  
"I know, and I'm pretty sure I've seen it before."  
  
"On like, John Wayne Gacy."  
  
Patrick smothered a laugh and left Joe's hi-five hanging, because he could see Pete's confidence faltering. "So, why the war paint?"  
  
"Girls love dudes in make up!" Pete said, as if everyone knew this. "It's like, sexy and dangerous and shit. Think about it: Bowie, Bolan, Cobain - "  
  
"Marilyn Manson," Joe offered, before absently mouthing a few lines of Simpsons dialogue under his breath.  
  
"Yeah, well, you'll be eating your words when I'm waist-deep in fans, bro."  
  
"I'll be eating take out from some shitty all-night diner while you refuse to let me in the van so you can nail some girl again, probably…"  
  
"Play your cards right and maybe _you_ could be the dude nailing some girl in the van, next time."  
  
Patrick tried not to flinch as Joe gave a dubious laugh and pulled his legs back to sit up and turn to face the TV. "I kind of doubt it, bro. But what are we gonna do for the Hallowe'en show?"  
  
"I was thinking we should go dressed as priests or something. It'd be ironic, kind of."  
  
"I still think The Crow is better, basically, but whatever."  
  
"To be honest, I pretty much don't care," Patrick shrugged. "As long as it doesn't cost me more than, like, fifteen bucks, I'll wear what you want."  
  
"Fine. Get dressed, we're going shopping."  
  
"You're taking that off your face, first, right?"  
  
Pete did not take off his make up, defiantly walking out of the apartment in full panda regalia. Patrick and Joe followed him into town, hanging behind as he strode ahead of them; Patrick wasn't sure if they were hanging back so as not to steal his limelight, to avoid being overtly associated with his ridiculous ass or because they kind of wanted to hang out together. Well, he knew he wanted to hang out with Joe, but not necessarily at Pete's expense.  
  
They made their way down the seemingly endless strait of Lincoln Avenue, past windows decked with lumpy squashes and fake cobwebs, to the costume store to choose something to wear. They picked up the priest costumes Pete seemed to have convinced himself were the best and most subversive joke since The Life of Brian, and a pallette of face paint so that Joe could also be The Crow if he really, really wanted. Then, on the way back through the weak, golden sun and autumnal chill, decided to stop at the bookstore for supplies.  
  
Frank was in his usual spot behind the counter, his cards laid out in a cross before him, this time. He scooped them up with a small smile when he saw them walk in.  
  
"Hi Frank."  
  
"My young friend! You're back so soon," he replied. "And you have company, today."  
  
"Um, yeah. My name's actually Patrick, and this Joe. I think you probably know Pete."  
  
"You playing a game, Frank, my man?" Joe asked, stepping up to the counter and reaching out to tilt the pack in Frank's hand so he could see the picture on the top card.  
  
"Not exactly," Frank said, handing them to him to look at. "They do originate from old world playing cards, but they're really only used for that in the backwoods of Europe, these days."  
  
"Ohh - these are those tarot things, right? I totally saw Lord of the Rings ones in the comic store!"  
  
On the other side of the small store, Patrick tried to pretend he was thoroughly interested in a book by some guy called Culpeper, and not trying to hide the furious burn in his cheeks.  
  
"They are. You want me to tell your fortune?"  
  
"Dude! Yes! But like, if it's bad, I don't want to know it, man. Just make some shit up, okay?"  
  
Frank laughed and Patrick turned to look at them, drawing his hand across his neck frantically, behind Joe's back, trying to silently beg him not to do it, irrationally afraid that he'd announce that Patrick had a ridiculous crush on him, even though he'd never even told him that Joe was in fact the object of his affections.  
  
Frank only smiled benignly in response and placed the cards on the counter, repeating the washing motion he'd used the first time. "Pick one."  
  
Joe picked up a card and flipped it so he could see the image. He instantly turned pink. "Oh. Well, that's subtle."  
  
"See, when you took that, you turned it the other way up."  
  
"Does it make a difference?"  
  
"Yes, very much so. When you invert a card you reverse its meaning. For the purposes of this reading, we had it the right way up."  
  
"Oh." Joe looked at it for a moment more and then handed it back.  
  
Frank studied it for a few seconds and looked over at Patrick knowingly. "This is an interesting card. It says you might be at a crossroads and you're uncertain which path to take. You're not sure whether to take the risk and follow your heart, embarking on a route that may be difficult or require a leap of faith, or whether to take the easier route that may not bring you what you truly want. Maybe you're figuring _yourself_ out a little - which at around your age is perfectly natural, of course."  
  
"Well… I mean, I guess."  
  
"The Lovers is also a card that indicates a strong, deeply-forged bond - usually romantic, but perhaps not always. My instinct is that very soon you'll find yourself completely and consumingly head over heels with some lucky soul and you'll have to make that decision to pursue it or not - choose your path. That's assuming you're not already there." Frank glanced up and caught Patrick's eye across the store from where he had been watching the exchange anxiously. "But I think you'll find that they're amenable to it."  
  
In the back corner, by the carved wooden dresser filled with small, blue jars of incense, Pete was sniggering to himself, staring intently at Patrick's crimson face. In Patrick's mind, Frank may as well have passed Joe a card reading, 'Did you know Patrick has a crush on you?'  
  
Joe remained very quiet at the front of the store, scratching the back of his hair awkwardly and glancing just a little over his shoulder. Patrick quickly turned away to look through Culpeper's recipes for a cure for death by embarrassment.  
  
"I fucking knew it," Pete whispered in his ear, sidling up behind him. "Do something about it, or I'll do it for you."  
  
"I fucking am!" Patrick hissed back. "Leave me alone, asshole."  
  
"Well, thanks, Frank," Joe was saying, breezily. "That was, like… interesting."  
  
"Not a half as interesting as it was for me," Frank laughed.  
  
"So, can I get a reading?" Pete asked, abandoning Patrick to move to the desk.  
  
"Well, you know usually I'd charge, but seeing as both your friends did…" Frank collected all the cards into a stack, shuffled them, and then spread them on the counter once more. "Go ahead."  
  
Pete chose his card and handed it to Frank, without turning it over.  
  
The expression on Frank's face, as he turned the card in his fingers, grew a little concerned. He adjusted his position as he straightened up a little.  
  
"The Six of Wands. When you first came in here, looking for advice, you said you were seeking success for your band. With success, I expect you also anticipate the fame and adulation that we assume comes with it. But it's a double edged sword - it could become a stick to beat you with. The success you're looking for is on its way, but you need to be wary of false friends and supporters, and of believing your own press. An unchecked ego, and not knowing when to stop, could easily be your downfall if you let them."  
  
"Deep," Pete mused. "So, check the haters and don't be an asshole?"  
  
"Easy for you to say, Frank," Joe snorted, looking to Patrick to share the joke. Patrick gave him a half-smile in response and picked up another book. Joe walked over to him, not quite standing as close as usual, picking up a book nearby and running his fingers over its edges. "When did you get a reading, anyway?" he asked, quietly.  
  
"Yesterday. I had some time to kill on my lunch hour."  
  
"Oh. What did you get?"  
  
Patrick hesitated, not sure he wanted to share. It was personal and incriminating and he wasn't entirely sure if Joe had the faintest idea what Frank was telling him, in spite of his paranoia. To be honest, he wasn't sure whether it had all been orchestrated with some sleight of hand to produce that very apt card for Joe. "It was just… um. Like, good luck, basically. The Wheel of Fortune."  
  
"Is that all?"  
  
"Yeah. Just that."  
  
Joe squinted at him for a minute and then turned to scan the shelves. He finally spotted what he was looking for and went over to the shelf to pick it up.  
  
"What're you doing?" Patrick asked, tensely.  
  
Joe just lifted the book briefly, so he could see its cover, and continued to thumb through _Tarot for Beginners.  
  
_ "Why do you need that?"  
  
"Curious."  
  
"Joe. Seriously. I told you what it said."  
  
At the desk, Pete and Frank were watching the exchange awkwardly. In the little shop there was nowhere to hide or anything to distract them.  
  
"Readings can be personal," Frank offered calmly. "It's perfectly reasonable to want to keep them private - for any reason."  
  
Reluctantly, Joe closed the book and slid it back onto the shelf. "Sorry."  
  
"It doesn't matter," Patrick told him. "Just forget about it."  
  
Joe nodded and mumbled, "Maybe I'll just, like, wait outside or something…"  
  
" _Joe_ …"  
  
The wooden beads swung closed without him so much as glancing back.  
  
"Great."  
  
"You okay, Ric?"  
  
"I'm fine!"  
  
Pete winced and turned to Frank. "Let me just pay for the shit I came here for, and then I'll take the kids home. I think they need a nap."  
  
Frank gave a small smile. "Well, I never intended to rile anybody up or anything."  
  
"Don't worry about it, man, Joe gets like this if you leave the seat up. Patrick's just always like this."  
  
Pete clamped a hand around the back of Patrick's neck as Frank bagged up his candles. "C'mon, bud, let's go make up with Trohman."  
  
"Get off."  
  
"Maybe if you asked him real nice."  
  
Irritably, Patrick slapped at his arm until he let go, and skulked out of the shop.  
  
Joe was leaning against the wall at the street end of the alley, his hoodie pulled up and his arms hugged around himself. For a second, Patrick stopped and watched him, wondering what had made him so touchy this time, and flinched when Joe looked up and caught him. He had no real choice but to walk over.  
  
"Hey."  
  
"Hey."  
  
"I don't know why it matters, or anything, but… it was all about just letting stuff happen and not worrying, because it'll happen the way it's supposed to, basically. To just, y'know: trust in fate."  
  
He seemed to muse on this for a minute, pouting and nibbling the inside of his lip, before simply shrugging and nodding.  
  
"I mean, your reading was way better than mine."  
  
"How?" Joe snorted doubtfully.  
  
"At least you get a say in what happens to you. I'm just expected to live with whatever happens to me."  
  
Joe seemed to soften at the thought, his shoulders sagging sympathetically, just in time for Pete to pounce on them both and drag them home, complaining about them being embarrassing.  
  
By the time they got home, Joe had forgotten his sulking enough to curl up on the futon with him, sharing a pizza in front of the TV while Pete returned to his room to pore over his books.  
  
\---  
  
The incident in the bookstore made Patrick more determined than ever to figure out his spell and try to take some control back. He was keeping a record of everything in a hardbacked notebook he'd bought at the dollar store, and carefully planning what he needed to do. The main part of the plan had to happen on Saturday night, during the new moon - the last one before Hallowe'en. He'd had to find out when that was from the calendar in his mom's kitchen when he visited her for dinner on Monday night, but it fell at the right time for what he needed. The idea was that he'd start brewing his potion on the full moon and it would grow in strength with the brightness of the moon. There was a lunar eclipse the same weekend that the moon was full, which had some kind of additional power that he didn't think he completely understood, but Frank had highlighted it to him and it worked out fine with his spell, so why not? It also cut down the time he had to wait for his spell to work to two weeks, and that made him feel much better.  
  
He'd planned it carefully: he knew how to cast a circle, now, he could do all the parts himself. They didn't have a show, so he could cry off social events and let them all go, so that he had the apartment to himself. Failing that, he could pack everything he needed into his backpack and go out. Maybe down to the lake. It made sense to be near water, anyway.  
  
He was still thinking about it when there was a soft knock at the door. Hurriedly, he shoved the book under his pillow and tried not to look like he'd been doing anything suspicious while lying in his room in silence. "Yeah?"  
  
Joe opened the door and poked his head around it. "You busy?"  
  
"Uh, no."  
  
He didn't wait to be invited, he just closed the door behind himself and moved over to sit on the bed. "You okay?"  
  
"Yeah, sure - why wouldn't I be?"  
  
Joe shrugged and traced the geometric patterns on the comforter with his fingertip.  
  
Patrick watched him watch his finger move across the fabric. "Are _you_ alright?"  
  
Joe just shrugged again. After a few moments, he said, "I've been having dreams and stuff."  
  
"What kind of dreams?"  
  
"Dreams about our forest, mostly."  
  
"Oh, yeah? Like what?" Patrick asked, feeling his cheeks turn at the notion that it was 'our forest'.  
  
"Like, always being there. You and me."  
  
"Well… that's okay, isn't it?"  
  
Joe nodded. "It is, it's just like, all I dream about. All the time."  
  
"It's probably just because it's on your mind, y'know? You think about it, so you dream about it, so when you next try to sleep, you think about how you'll probably dream about it and stuff, so you do, and then…"  
  
"Maybe. It's just kind of weird, though."  
  
"I mean, it can't be that weird - I dream about it, too."  
  
He became unnaturally still, especially for Joe, and asked in a very measured voice. "What did you dream last night?"  
  
Patrick shrugged and hoped the truth didn't show on his face. "I don't know, dude… it was just… I don't remember much. We were just there."  
  
"Nothing at all?"  
  
He couldn't admit to the truth - the mossy riverbank under his skin - he'd die of embarrassment on the spot. He'd woken before it was even light, his pillow damp with sweat, half convinced it was from the drips of water from Joe's wet curls. He hadn't been able to go back to sleep after that.  
  
"No, dude, nothing. Why? What did you dream?"  
  
"It doesn't matter."  
  
Joe climbed to his feet and stretched, his arms and spine clicking. Patrick knew it was probably unsubtle to stare at the exposed skin under his shirt, but he kept looking, anyway. It wasn't even that Joe's stomach was something he'd never seen before, or even touched - he had mentally archived at least four instances - but it was the memories it invoked from his dreams. Dreams that were vivid and clear and stayed with him after he woke. Maybe their forest was the place to find out the truth.

"Joe, do you want to -"  
  
But Joe cut him off with a shake of the head. "I'm gonna go to bed, dude. All this being a wizard, now, is kind of grinding me down."  
  
Patrick nodded and watched him leave, then flopped down on his pillow and tugged the book back out from under it. It seemed like he didn't have much choice.  
  
\---  
  
That Wednesday night was the first time all month that they'd actually had a real band practice. They worked through all the songs they were going to play on Hallowe'en, when they were actually headlining at the Fireside Bowl. Then, at Pete's insistence, they climbed out onto the flat roof outside his window and cast a circle to give thanks for the success they were already starting to see. There was a low rumble of thunder in the distance, as they began, and Patrick felt Joe's hand tighten in his. He squeezed back.  
  
He could see the wind whipping up strands of Andy's hair, and regretted not picking up his bodywarmer to put on before they climbed out.  
  
They were in the middle of a low chant, murmuring their gratitude and asking for continued support, when a great gash of blue and lilac tore across the sky.  
  
All of them flinched and ducked reflexively, except Pete, who burst into a gleeful cackle. "Thank you!" he called into the night. "Thank you for joining us! We're grateful that you offer us your power."  
  
Patrick looked at Andy, worried by the frown on his face. If Andy thought something was off, Andy who was Number One Pete Apologist, then there was definitely something off.  
  
It started to rain just before they came inside. Slow, heavy drops that hit the rim of Patrick's glasses and splashed into his eyes. The candle in the centre of their circle took a direct hit just as they finished, snuffing it out in an instant.  
  
"Well, that's a good omen," Joe muttered to Patrick, scuffing the ring of salt across the roof with his foot.  
  
Patrick could only nod, his arms tucked around himself against the chill.  
  
He and Joe helped Andy carry his kit down to the van, and came back to find Pete still sitting on his window ledge, foot wedged against the frame, staring up at the colourful sky. His room seemed suddenly full of candles that he'd not noticed, earlier, and the journal on Pete's nightstand was open on a page close to the back of the book.  
  
"Dude. You want to come in? It's a little risky, isn't it?"  
  
Pete glanced over to Joe, grinning. "It's awesome, bro - this is the power of the fucking Universe!"  
  
"Yeah, okay, Prince Adam," Patrick huffed, tugging on his arm. "Time to come inside."  
  
Pete reached out and patted him on the shoulder. "I'm good, Ric. I'm just watching the storm, man."  
  
"C'mon," Joe sighed, turning Patrick by the waist and pushing him out the door. "Let Ororo look after himself."  
  
"Night!" Pete called after them. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do!"  
  
Not that that narrowed things down a whole bunch…  
  
Patrick allowed himself to be led as far as the bedrooms, where Joe let him go and stopped outside his door. He scratched a hand through his windswept curls and asked, "Hey, you know what I always wanted to do?"  
  
 _Make out with me?_ he thought, hopefully, but not optimistic enough to ask it aloud. "Well… I dunno, get asked to be Anthrax's latest guitarist, or something?"  
  
Joe snorted. "I mean, _obviously_ , but actually, I was thinking about, like, storm chasing."  
  
"Oh. Really?"  
  
Joe had once told him, sitting in the back of the van in Oklahoma on a summer night, with the rain battering the roof, that tornadoes were his biggest fear, so why he thought he'd be up for storm chasing, Patrick didn't really know.  
  
"I just kind of thought it would be cool to go down and park on Lake Shore and watch it without a whole bunch of city in the way, basically."  
  
"Um…" _That's not storm chasing, dude, that's lovers' lane st-_ "I guess that sounds pretty cool."  
  
"So, you'll come?"  
  
Patrick blinked at him. "What? _Now_?"  
  
"Dude, it's not like we get thunderstorms like this every day - it's October, this is super weird - and there's no time like the present, right?"  
  
Patrick had kind of been looking forward to putting on his pyjamas and hanging out in one of their nice, cosy bedrooms, possibly engaging in a little bit of ambiguous snuggling, but if Joe wanted to hang out in a Faraday cage on wheels like a courting couple from the '50s, then he'd be an idiot to pass it up.  
  
He took a deep breath. "Alright. Let me just get a dry sweater."  
  
He shut himself in his room and put on the Taking Back Sunday hoodie Joe had lent him when they were last on tour, and he'd never given back. While he was there, he thumbed quickly through his book, wondering if lightning was any use at all, wishing books had a CTRL+F function. The index at the back only went as far as 'J', the final pages lost some time in the past, so he gave up, disappointed.  
  
They parked on the street at Montrose Harbour, looking out over the water towards the lights downtown, listening to the album Spitalfield had just put out that summer, the wipers still running to keep the windshield clear.  
  
Patrick enjoyed watching Joe's glee at the cloudy strobing over the water, the colours catch in his wide eyes. The storm was definitely the most impressive he'd seen in a long time. It had been warm the past few weeks, and it was around the time the cold fronts started to set in, but it was bigger even than the ones he'd seen late in hot summers.  
  
Deep down, part of him wondered if maybe this was something to do with them. What had they conjured up? What if Frank was right in what he'd said to Pete, and they'd called up more than they could handle?  
  
"Hey, Joe?"  
  
"Yeah?" he asked, glancing over at him with a look of awe on his face.  
  
"I was just thinking…"  
  
Joe swallowed, the corner of his mouth twitching,"What about?"  
  
"About Pete."  
  
He seemed to lose interest a little at that. "And?"  
  
"Is it me, or is he getting a little too into this whole thing?"  
  
"Maybe. You saw that whole performance earlier, right? And yesterday he was talking about learning alchemy. I was like, 'Dude, 'cause your family isn't rich enough already?'."  
  
"Hopefully, he'll drop it when there's no more instant gratification."  
  
"Maybe. But what if it keeps rewarding him?"  
  
"I thought you were pretty sure half of this stuff is confirmation bias."  
  
"I mean, _I am_ , dude, but…"  
  
"So, what about when we meditated?" Patrick asked, a little wounded. It felt pretty real for him.  
  
"Because this is different. It's sci-fi quality. This is like, alternate dimension shit and I've got books by, like, _actual scientists_ on that."  
  
Patrick looked at him skeptically. "You sure?"  
  
"Yes," Joe assured him, firmly. "You wanna try now?"  
  
"What, meditating? Here?"  
  
"Sure, why not?"  
  
"Because, y'know…" Patrick quickly realised he didn't have a clear conclusion to his sentence, and if their past efforts were anything to go by, only an idiot would refuse in this scenario.  
  
"...because?"  
  
"You know what? Sure. Let's try it. Maybe we'll get struck by lightning and develop superpowers or something."  
  
Joe grinned widely, his eyes lighting up even though there was no lightning to coincide with it. He gestured to the back seat. "After you."  
  
"Huh?" Patrick started, before shutting himself up hurriedly. "I mean, right. Sure." He climbed over the central console and tumbled into the back, trying not to be embarrassed when Joe laughed and patted his butt as he unwedged himself.  
  
Joe followed him through the gap, using his shoulder for stability and then sat down sideways on the seat, holding out a hand. Patrick grasped it quickly, hoping Joe hadn't noticed how eagerly he'd done so. His heart skipped a little at the soft smile Joe gave him in response.  
  
"So, are we still doing this?" he asked, lifting their joined hands a little. "Pete kind of said it wasn't necessary."  
  
"Totally," Joe replied, slapping at Patrick's shins lightly, to get him to unfold them. "It just feels, like… right, dude."  
  
Patrick did as he prompted, waiting for Joe to shift his leg out along the back edge of the seat, the other hanging into the footwell, so he could shuffle into the space. "Y'know, I know it's probably weird, but I _don't_ feel weird about doing this."  
  
"Me either," Joe grinned, and rubbed his thumbs over Patrick's fingers affectionately. "We're just a couple of weird little dudes, being weird together."  
  
"I'm glad it's us, y'know?" He laughed nervously.  
  
Joe seemed to hesitate at first, his face turning slightly pink in the cheeks. Patrick envied his ability to blush without looking like the cross-section of a watermelon. "I'm glad, too," he said finally. "I mean… I feel like we're a pretty good team."  
  
"Yeah," Patrick nodded.  
  
"Out of like, all our friends, I think… I mean, I know you and Pete are kind of a double act, but…"  
  
"We're not, dude, we're just Patrick and Pete."  
  
"No, but I mean, out of all of the dudes we hang out with, I think you're my closest friend."  
  
Patrick could feel himself turning into the watermelon-faced idiot he'd been afraid of. "Yeah?"  
  
"It's okay if you kind of like... see Pete as your best friend, because you're all soulmate-y or something, but out of all those dudes, I can't think of any of them I could be this cool with."  
  
"Hey, me either. And I feel like we are pretty close, y'know? Sometimes, when things around here get a little too nuts, I just kind of think 'Man, I need to go hang out with Joe,' y'know? It's kind of like when you're on tour, and you're having the most awesome time, but getting home and sleeping in your own bed is a million times better."  
  
"I'm your bed?" Joe laughed, scrunching up his nose.  
  
"Basically," Patrick joked, bumping their joined pairs of hands together absently. "And just so you know, I have room for more than just Pete, dude."  
  
Joe was looking intently at their hands, smiling lopsidedly. "Good. It'd be pretty shitty if you were like, 'Actually, bro, you're super annoying.'"  
  
"Oh, you are," Patrick assured him, enjoying his laugh. "You are like the single worst dad-joker that I have ever met. And I've met _your dad_ , who I swear to God is the source of all dad jokes."  
  
"Technically, dude, he is the source of all my dad jokes."  
  
They sat there together, talking until Joe complained that his legs were getting stiff and his back sore, and they realised it was after midnight and they'd spent hours sitting there, getting no meditation done whatsoever. He'd had to tug his hands free to take off his glasses and wipe tears of laughter from his cheeks, at one stage, and Joe had immediately reclaimed them when he was done, even though they weren't even meditating.  
  
When Joe decided they needed to move, he'd thought it was a hint that their evening was done, but when he shifted and stretched, Joe said, "You didn't want to go home yet, did you?"  
  
"Don't you want to?"  
  
"Well… no, dude, not yet. But if you're tired…"  
  
"I'm not. I mean, I do have work tomorrow, but…." Patrick smiled at him, rolling his head from side to side to get the tension out of his shoulders and neck. "I mean, I'm kind of cramped and a little tired, but I'm having fun… The storm's kind of died down, so why don't we just go back and hang out at home?"  
  
Joe's expression seemed to waver between disappointment and his dopey, self-conscious grin. "I mean, like, if that's what you want, I'm down…"  
  
When they got home Joe headed straight into his room, kicking off his shoes at the door and climbed onto the bed. Patrick followed, without so much as breaking the flow of his sentence, settling down next to him at the head end instead of the bottom, where he'd usually hang out. A tiny part of him hoped that he would be allowed to spend the night again, but a couple more hours would do, too.  
  
So, when Joe complained that it was cold and climbed under the covers, holding the comforter up for him to climb in next to him, he didn't hesitate.  
  
\---  
  
He didn't remember falling asleep, or turning the lights out, or even when they decided he should stay in Joe's room over night. Maybe they hadn't. When he woke, he was still propped against the pillows, one arm stretched above his head and heavy with numbness. Joe was lying next to him, face buried between the edge of his pillow and Patrick's ribs. His hair caught the light from the crack in the curtains and Patrick lifted his hand to stroke his curls, but caught himself. What if it woke him up and he had to explain what the hell he was doing?  
  
Reluctantly, he sighed and shuffled down in the bed, knowing he had to be up for work in a couple of hours and disappointed when Joe snuffled sleepily and turned over.  
  
\---  
  
Saturday night couldn't come fast enough. He'd woken up first, the next morning, glad to find that Joe had slept through a decidedly awkward situation, and made his escape to work without having to see him in case the watery shenanigans in his subconscious were somehow visible in his eyes. He was so mortified and determined not to mess things up before he could complete his spell, that he avoided Joe for the next two days.  
  
Patrick had carefully packed everything into his backpack to keep it safe and hidden, and laid the groundwork with Pete, telling him when he got up at lunchtime that he thought he was coming down with something, so he wouldn't get harrassed into going out, later. Andy's old band had a show in town, so he was pretty sure they'd all go. He'd decided to climb out Pete's window and cast his spell on the flat roof outside, open to the elements but nowhere anyone could interfere. He was a little guy on his own, he didn't feel like explaining to the cops - or worse, a bunch of college idiots - what he was doing with candles and flowers in the middle of the night.  
  
When the apartment fell quiet, he picked up his bag and snuck into Pete's room, pushing up the sash window and climbing out onto the roof outside. He kicked aside some patches of moss and knelt down, carefully pulling his equipment and ingredients out and setting them down in front of him.  
  
He took a deep breath and lit the tall, green dinner candle in the holder in front of him and set an incense of cedar, rose and copal to smoke, then began casting his circle.  
  
Meticulously, he ground together lavender, mint and basil with a spoon in a small dish and scooped the pulp into a fancy energy drink bottle he'd bought for four dollars and poured straight down the sink. Then he topped it off with rose water and half a bottle of Evian, and held it in the flame of his candle, repeating his carefully scripted incantation.  
  
The theory was that the strength of the potion would grow with the moon as it became full, and by the new moon would be ready to be consumed - only, because of the lunar eclipse, he wouldn't have to wait for the new moon, because, in effect, a new moon would rise from the obscured full, that night.  
  
"Please, please work," he whispered into the bottle, before putting the lid back on tightly and giving it a swirl to make sure all the leaves and pulp were safely beneath the water line.  
  
It wasn't until he stood up to deconstruct his circle that he caught sight of the figure leaning at Pete's window.  
  
"You done?"  
  
Patrick's heart nearly exploded through his chest. "Joe?"  
  
"Do you mind if I close this? It's kind of making the door rattle," Joe said, looking flustered.  
  
"Shit," Patrick cringed, pressing his hands over his eyes. He didn't have time for this, right now. He needed to close the circle. "No, no - sorry, I didn't think anyone was in, dude…"  
  
Joe just nodded and pulled the window down. Patrick did his best to gather himself, with what was left of his heart in his mouth, thanking and dispatching the spirits to do his bidding. Then, self-consciously aware that Joe probably heard half of what he had said, threw his things back into his backpack.  
  
Joe was standing in the kitchen, leaning against the counter in his green plaid pyjama pants, eating a bowl of cereal, when Patrick climbed back in. He looked up at him with an awkward smile and waved with his spoon.  
  
"You're not going out?" Patrick asked, trying not to sound like he was mortified to his very core. "I mean… I figured you'd be going to the show."  
  
"I guess I'm coming down with the same thing as you," Joe replied.  
  
Patrick looked at him, watching him stir the small, colourful hoops in his bowl. "I'm not sick," he admitted. "I just wanted to stay home tonight and I didn't want the arguments, y'know?"  
  
Joe didn't look up. "To be honest, me either, dude. I just kind of hoped that with the guys not here, we could like, hang out, or something."  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"We kind of haven't hung out at all, the past few days and I thought maybe we could do that... play some Playstation or… like, meditate together, maybe." He shrugged. "But I mean, if you're like… busy...."  
  
"What? No, man, I'm done, I just… had to do a thing, y'know? And I mean, I was at my mom's last night and work in the day, right? I brought you home pumpkin squares - I left them in the kitchen."  
  
"You did?"  
  
"Yeah!"  
  
"I didn't get them… I guess Pete must've got there first. They're probably being used to bribe Satan or something."  
  
Patrick sighed, annoyed. "That little asshole… I'll get you more," he promised, even if that meant asking his mom to make a batch specifically.  
  
Joe smiled a little and nodded without looking up at him. After a few moments, he turned to dump his bowl in the sink. "You gonna come and hang out, or not?"  
  
"Yeah - yeah, dude, of course. I'll be right there." He watched Joe disappear into his room and then shut himself in his bedroom and collapsed on to the mattress, taking a few deep breaths. Whatever Joe thought he knew, he clearly hadn't figured out the truth.  
  
He climbed off the bed when he was sufficiently calmed and pulled the bottle out of his bag. He wasn't sure what to do with it, now. He tilted it back and forth, watching the flowers and leaves floating inside, then stood it on the windowsill, hoping that the light of the moon over the next two weeks would help somehow, more desperate than ever for the spell to work.  
  
Joe had moved to the living room, by the time Patrick returned, so he followed and settled down next to him on the futon, pulling his feet up and letting his knees half fall into Joe's lap. Joe absently switched the remote to the other hand and dropped the free one to Patrick's leg. It wasn't unusual in ordinary circumstances, they'd lost their boundaries some time around Louisville, or the third time Pete insisted one of them peed in a bottle in the back of the van, rather than making a rest stop. But after the awkwardness of the last few days, it was comforting; it meant things were going to be okay.  
  
Carefully, Patrick shifted and rested his head on Joe's shoulder, laughing at Cartman on TV. They hardly talked all evening, just sat together comfortably in the light of the television. By the time Pete stumbled in with his girlfriend, one of Patrick's legs was tucked over Joe's, his other foot on the coffee table, and Joe was dozing with his head propped on Patrick's.  
  
"Aww," she giggled, holding on to Pete. "That's the cutest, gayest thing I've ever seen."  
  
"I'm bisexual," Joe complained into Patrick's hair, and Pete caught Patrick's eye with his mouth a little open in surprise. It was the first time either of them had heard him declare it, even in jest.  
  
"Oh, well, whatever - still looks gay to me," she smirked, sing-songing, "niiiiight!" as she pushed Pete towards his room.  
  
"I didn't know that," Patrick said quietly, once they were both gone.  
  
"Well, that's your own fault," Joe informed him, as tartly as his sleepy voice could muster.  
  
"How?"  
  
He felt Joe shrug against his shoulder and issue what sounded very much like a small snore.  
  
When it got too cold to sit in the living room any longer, Patrick hauled him to his feet by the hands and led him back to his bedroom, gently pushing him at the bed and moving to leave. "Night, dude."  
  
"Night? Where are you going?"  
  
"What do you mean 'where are you going'? I'm going to bed."  
  
"You can sleep here, if you want."  
  
Patrick blinked at him, behind his glasses. "Huh?"  
  
He watched as Joe threw back the covers of his bed and climbed in, leaving one side open. "I miss being on tour," he explained. "It's nice to have company."  
  
"Dude, I…" Patrick took a deep breath and cut himself off. Why the hell was he arguing? He'd slept in Joe's bed already this week, and after Pete faceplanted off stage, it was no big deal. "Fine," he said, pulling off his glasses and hoodie and climbing in beside him, settling on his back and looking over at the grin on the face pressed into the pillow beside him. "Night, my weird little buddy."  
  
"Night, little dude," Joe murmured, tucking his arm around Patrick's and falling asleep almost instantly.  
  
Patrick reached out his free arm to turn off the lamp and laid in the dark, hoping he didn't have any more dreams about the forest and the particular type of magic that happened in it.  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title from Creeper's _Hiding With Boys_  
>  Quote from PVRIS's _Eyelids_

**Author's Note:**

>  _Title from Interpol's song, 'Pioneer to the Falls'_  
>  Quote from The Academy Is... song, 'Same Blood'.


End file.
